1. The Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for processing sausage and, in particular, for separating individual smoked or cooked sausage links from a series of connected sausage links.
The apparatus used for separation of individual sausage links from a chain of connected sausage links can conveniently be divided into two categories. The first category would include the link separators that are an adjunct or an integral part of a sausage linking machine, that is, a machine that forms links from stuffed sausage casings. Examples of such apparatus are found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,689,972; 3,059,272; 3,276,352; 3,435,482 and 4,973,039. Apparatus of this type is usually employed in the manufacture of fresh sausage.
The second category of such apparatus is the link separators that are used to separate cooked or smoked sausage links. In the manufacture of such sausage, the sausage links are formed and held together by the unfilled, twisted casing connecting adjacent links. After forming, the connected links are placed on racks in a cookhouse or smokehouse where the sausage is processed to form the finished product. The connected links are then separated into individual links for packaging and sale. The present invention is directed to this second category of link-separating apparatus. Examples of such apparatus can be found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,158,895; 3,808,636 and 4,060,875.
Existing apparatus employed to cut the preformed links into separate links are quite complicated considering the operation that they perform. These machines often do not properly register their cutting mechanism with the length of the link and, therefore, cut the sausage link itself rather than cutting the twisted casing between adjacent links. These machines often employ complicated and expensive electric-eye sensors and other technically sophisticated mechanisms. Even when the indexing is proper, cutting occurs indiscriminately by any point between adjacent links. Aesthetically it is better to center the cut between links so that equal amounts of the twisted casing are left on either end. It is, at times, more preferable to cut the casing between links as close to the end of the link as possible so that all the twisted casing is removed.